Monks from Namgyal Monastery will return to Ithaca College from Sept. 22 through Sept. 27 for six days of public sand-mandala construction, meditation and discussions centered on impermanence and compassion.
The free residency culminates Sunday afternoon when the monks dismantle the finished design and carry its sand in procession to the pond beside Muller Chapel.
Six days of public construction
The monks will build the geometric religious artwork grain by grain from memory in the upper atrium of the Dorothy D. and Roy H. Park Center for Business and Sustainable Enterprise. Construction is open to visitors from 9 in the morning until 4 in the afternoon each day.
At 3 each afternoon from Sept. 22 through Sept. 26, the monks will pause for chanting and a beginner-friendly meditation focused on cultivating presence.
The residency is the monastery's fifth at Ithaca College and continues a partnership between the campus and the Namgyal Monastery Institute of Buddhist Studies. Organizers said the project gives students and regional visitors a place for quiet observation and reflection.
Eric Steinschneider, an associate professor of philosophy and religion, said mandalas are understood in Tibetan Buddhism as idealized representations of an enlightened realm, the universe and the human body. Their deliberate destruction emphasizes that even intricate work is temporary.
Ceremonies and community discussions
Ithaca College President La Jerne Terry Cornish and monastery representatives will offer remarks during an opening ceremony at 10 in the morning Sept. 22 in the Business School atrium.
Later that day, student and certified death doula Madison VanDerLinde will lead a Death Café discussion about death, dying and life transitions from 11:50 in the morning to 12:50 in the afternoon in Clark Lounge.
Students from Steinschneider's Peace and Nonviolence class will lead an “Imagining Peace” roundtable at the same time Sept. 24 in Clark Lounge. The discussion will examine how people can imagine social and ecological futures built around collective flourishing.
The program also includes a screening of the 2024 documentary “The Wisdom of Happiness,” focused on the 14th Dalai Lama, from 6 to 8 in the evening Sept. 26 at Hockett Family Recital Hall in the Whalen Center for Music. Steinschneider, Office of Religious and Spiritual Life Director Lauren Kelly Benson and a local Tibetan community representative will lead a conversation afterward.
Dissolution ceremony closes the residency
The monks will begin the dissolution ceremony at 3 in the afternoon Sept. 27 in the Business School atrium. They will ritually dismantle the mandala, then carry the colored sand to the pond beside Muller Chapel before a reception.
The act is intended to demonstrate impermanence rather than preserve the finished artwork. College organizers connected that theme with campus discussions about adapting to academic, technological and personal change.
All events are free and open to the public. Guest parking is available in the Visitor Lot on Conservatory Drive and in O Lot, and visitors observing construction are asked to maintain a quiet environment.
People seeking disability accommodations may contact Steinschneider as soon as possible through Ithaca College's Department of Philosophy and Religion.
FingerLakes1.com is the region’s leading all-digital news publication. The company was founded in 1998 and has been keeping residents informed for more than two decades. Have a lead? Send it to news@fingerlakes1.com.